by James Taylor

Bella (Harry Creelman) is celebrating her twenty-ninth birthday with a group of friends who are intricately connected in a web of sexual relationships and desire, whilst her father (Charlie Holt) lies in hospital dying of a brain tumour. Gradually the fairly charged, but superficially trivial, conversation probes deeper into the real problems that concern the play: feminine identity in the modern world and how a woman can participate in institutions such as marriage without surrendering to the oppression on which they were founded.

The plot of the play is interrupted continually by Bella’s memories of her and her father, a masculine authority figure who seems to have shown little respect for her mother. It is significant that the play’s name should be his pet name for her, since this articulates how Bella rebels throughout the play against masculine dominance.  She does this mainly by having control in her relationships and yet fails to find a new identity for herself outside of his definition of her as Rabbit.

The occupation with the sensual and the immediate runs throughout the play: Richard (Jonathon Rhodes) is chastised at one point by Sandy (Emerald Fennel) with the words, “You dislike looking at something, you have to turn it into something else, love, romance…,” which emphasises the feminine characters’ rejection of the masculine categories of meaning.  The realisation comes late in the play that “you need light and dark”, that you need some categories of meaning or binaries to have a meaningful existence. The question it leaves is how feminism might redefine the masculine categories that it has so far failed to do.

Though the thematic aspects of the play deserve due respect, it often fails to deliver in form and style: the father’s scenes often fail to seem relevant or make their meaning clear and thus appear as intrusions. The play sometimes fails to keep the balance in creating colloquial and natural conversation between stylistic exaggeration and clichéd caricature.

However, the cast manages to conceal this most of the time: the dialogue throughout the play has vast amounts energy, especially the dialogue between Jonathan Rhodes, Harry Creelman and Emerald Fennell, which injects life and authenticity into the play. Alex Bowles (Tom) and Jenny Ross (Emily), though playing less acerbic and domineering characters, inhabit their characters excellently, recreating a more genuine social atmosphere in their responses to the other characters’ violent outbursts. Charlie Holt had the hardest task in this play in handling the intrusive father scenes in a role that would have suited an older man, but often manages to salvage them through the sheer intensity of his performance. Seeing Rabbit is not a matter of life and death, but it certainly asks some interesting questions about feminism, though its style is at times clichéd, and even at its low points the actors provide an energy and intensity that makes it an engaging play.

Two men were contaminated with chemical powder earlier this week, after a drum of waste products began to leak behind a shop in Oxfordshire. The incident took place in Banbury on Wednesday morning, after the cleaners came into contact with waste products from the Specsavers Optician branch on Bridge Street. The men began vomiting, itching and broke out in blisters, and emergency services were called to the scene at around 9:15am.The incident is being investigated by Cherwell District Council and the Oxfordshire fire service.Deputy Chief Fire Officer Mike Smythe commented: "We just had two of our specialist officers in gas-tight suits enter the area, they've made tests of the substance. "We are confident, at the moment, that the substance is in fact inert but we do need to finish off those tests results." Officials have not released details of the results of the testing, but it is believed that the waste products in question were the plastic shavings of spectacle lenses, which created a white powder, created after opticians resized the lenses to fit inside the frames. The two men involved were taken to Horton Hospital, after they were washed down with warm water in a decontamination tent and dressed in sterile white paper suits. The clothing has been taken away for forensic examinations.

Today marks 18 years since the Berlin Wall fell, and the national debate — are things better for it? — rolls absurdly on. As reported by Welt, one in five Germans wants the wall back, surely a symptom of a disastrous case of ignorance plaguing the German youth. According to a study by the Freie Universität in Berlin, they think the wall was build by the Allies, the Stasi was just like any normal secret service, East Germany wasn’t a dictatorship and their most famous statesman was none other than Helmut Kohl, (West) German Chancellor from 1982 to 1998.

But maybe the only good news coming out of the “Ostalgie” debate is that the quaint Trabant may be making a return. I’m not convinced by that report though — just look at this giveaway sentence, hidden right at the end:

The company is looking for a producer to make a first run of 200 models.

In the same way that Michael Knighton once looked for ?20m to buy Manchester United, I presume.

For some British coverage, try Timothy Garton Ash’s take on the anniversary in yesterday’s Guardian.

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Sara-Christine Gemson looks ta the troubles befalling Oxfprd's small businesses 
Coming back from the summer vacation, you may have noticed the addition of the Gourmet Burger Kitchen and Wagamama to the culinary offerings of central Oxford. A stroll down Cowley Road reveals the arrival of a Costa Coffee and the opening of a new G&D’s. Little Clarendon Street, which formally appeared to be a bastion of indie charm (if in appearance only) recently added Strada to the chains to which it plays host. What’s happening to Oxford? Despite its unique architecture that attracts tourists from all over the world, are its commercial offerings becoming increasingly homogenous? And if so, is this something of concern?

On this question, the City Council abdicates responsibility for any major role in the nature of shops and restaurants available in Oxford. John Kulasek, the Acting Assets Manager for commercial rents at the city council, while hesitating to give an exact figure, said that the town council owned at most five percent of the commercial spaces in Oxford. On Cowley Road in particular, the town council has very little control over the commercial spaces available: “I’ve not actually counted them but I imagine there must be a couple of hundred shops on Cowley Road. The City council owns six. So our influence there is very slight.” However, he admits that the council does have a bigger influence in the center of town, where it owns entire streets such as George Street or stretches of Broad Street as well as the Covered Market. For the property that it does own, the council has a policy to try to maximise local opportunities. Everything else being equal, the council would favour a local business over a chain: “In terms of commercial shops and restaurants we would look at all offers received and, wherever possible, try to use a local company.” So how does he explain the Gourmet Burger Kitchen replacing the independently owned lebanese restaurant Tarboush on George Street? In that case, the owner signed over his claim to the property to GBK and the council didn’t actively seek out a chain. More generally though, Mr. Kulasek asserts “Sometimes you can’t hold the tide back” so the council tries to concentrate the chains in one area rather than have them scattered all over the city. In the three and a half years that he’s been in his position he has noted a change “I’ve noticed an acceleration of chains trying to get into the city.”

For Ian Pavier, the manager of Hedges, one of the butchers in the Covered Market, the current trend dates much further back. The Covered Market wasn’t always filled with souvenir shops and cafes catering to tourists: “In the last fifteen years the butchers and fishmongers have all dwindled away.” Supermarkets like Sainbury’s and Tesco, with their centrally located “local” or “metro” branches can capture a major share of the grocery business even in a town like Oxford, where the majority of students don’t have cars and can’t drive to the big supermarkets on the outskirts. There has been an outcry in the press and in recent books published on the supermarket industry in the UK on how big supermarkets are even encroaching on small city center shops with their smaller “convenience” shops. Conversely, the “Market Investigation into the Supply of Groceries in the UK” report published by the Competition Commission on 31 October concluded: “Concerns have also been raised regarding Sainsbury’s and Tesco’s expansion in convenience store retailing. We do not find any adverse effect on competition arising from these issues. We consider that those convenience store operators that provide consumers with a strong retail offer will continue to survive and prosper, and the evidence suggests that current developments in convenience store retailing reflect consumer preferences.” This reflects Mr. Pavier’s experience when Sainbury’s first opened in the center of town. While they initially experienced a drop in business, it didn’t last: “People like Sainbury’s and Tesco’s don’t really know what butchery is so people go there once or twice but can’t find what they want so they go back to the butchers.”

So is Oxford no worse off for having lost a few independent restaurants and shops in exchange for chain restaurants and the big supermarkets? It depends what you are looking for. Wanting to ensure a uniform, quality experience and avoid any variation that might tarnish the company reputation, head offices make sure that franchises provide a certain level of service, quality of food and maintenance of venue. Aneta Wetlsha, the assistant manager at GBK on George Street explains that people from the central office visit regularly to make sure that the franchise is abiding by company rules. In some cases, customers are quite happy with the result. “I don’t see it as a big loss, given that there are three other similar restaurants left” says Farid Boussaid, a student, of Tarboush being replaced by GBK. “The service [at Tarboush] was not always great and the burgers [at GBK] are excellent!”  Similarly, John and Ann Priest who’ve been living in Oxfordshire since 1988 have noticed that Oxford has become more commercial but didn’t seem too concerned about the trend. In fact, many customers actively seek out chains for the familiarity they offer. Seth Anziska regularly studies in coffee shops and chooses his venue based on the type of work he’s doing: “For uninterrupted writing, I prefer Starbucks on Cornmarket, which has outlets, long hours and no accessible wireless. Sometimes not being able to get online is a must to avoid distraction. The familiar ritual of Starbucks means I could be anywhere, which helps to keep me grounded.”

On the other hand, it’s precisely that uniformity that can be off-putting. Independent businesses tend to be a more integral part of the community and make an effort to offer a more personalised service. Jan Rasmussen is the owner of Green’s Cafe on St Giles: “What we try to offer here is to be part of the local community. I’ve been here for two years now and I know pretty much all the regulars. People know me, we have a chat.” Because it’s their own business and it’s usually “one of one”, owners of such independent businesses are often far more actively involved in the daily operations. As Mr. Rasmussen puts it, “Places like Starbuck’s and Costa do very well, but when you go in, you don’t normally meet Mr. Costa.” This doesn’t go unnoticed. Customers such as Aleksandra Gadzala note the difference in the service offerings in independent places likes Green’s: “The independent coffee shops have more character, often friendlier staff and a greater variety in terms of food.” Indeed there is often a certain flexibility in the offerings of independent restaurants that chains can’t accommodate. At Green’s, you can ask for something off the menu and they will be happy to satisfy your special request.

This attention to individual and local needs is what distinguishes the independent shops from the chains. Green’s flexibility stands in contrast to Wagamama, where any special request would need to be sent to London for approval: “The customers should experience the same service everywhere they go […]. They [the franchises] can also create their own seasonal specials but all these need approval from the UK Wagamama head office team. We obtain our food from our central depot which supplies all our restaurant so that we can have a standard uniformity throughout the group and achieve high quality and standards in all our restaurants, so that the food consumed in Oxford is of the same quality as the food served in any of our other branch’s.”

Similarly, the big supermarkets arrive with their established selection of products that don’t necessarily reflect local tastes, needs or products. At Hedges all the pork and lamb is from the Cotswolds area and they actively try to sell as much local product as possible. The big supermarkets are now starting to offer local products, but these new offerings seem to be a marketing ploy as opposed to an organic way of doing business. This can be seen in Tesco’s official line on the local products it sells: “Tesco is British farming’s biggest customer and our own customers tell us they want us to do even more to find and stock great local products. This year we have opened up seven regional offices all of which are making great progress in this area, and have introduced 600 new lines. It’s something we’re committed to.” (More generally, when trying to find out about service offerings and their relationship to Oxford, managers and owners of independent shops and restaurants were available and happy to talk while I had to go through press offices based in London for chains such as Wagamama and Tesco.
Even though both chains and independent stores can offer quality products and services, the concern in Oxford is that independents are being pushed out because they can’t afford increasingly exorbitant rents. Max Mason is the owner of the Big Bang, a restaurant on Walton Street in Jericho that offers gourmet bangers and mash. He expresses serious concerns about the changing nature of the commercial offerings in Oxford: “Oxford is a place of international interest, a place people visit wanting to see oldie Britain. They want to see them cobbles, they want to see the Covered Market, they want to see independent places.” Yet such places are being pushed out because “Oxford is so expensive that only the big chains can afford the rent.”

So what does the future hold for the independent shops and restaurants of Oxford?  There is hope, though success depends on a lucky combination of good business sense and hard work. When he opened Green’s two years ago, Mr. Rasmussen was both tactical and pragmatic. He couldn’t open in a more prime location because of the competition and the expensive rents. But he found a promising location on St Giles: “We had to choose our location very carefully. We are lucky, we are in an independent area. St Giles is not the main shopping area and there aren’t many commercial properties here so there can’t be a Starbucks or something next door, which is something we definitely considered.” Mr. Mason also highlights the importance of intelligent appraisal: “You need to really work hard on what you are, what your special slant is on the market, how you are different from your competitors and then work out if it’s financially viable. It’s a tricky balancing act.” Fortunately, there’s a critical mass in Oxford that’s interested in keeping independent places open and that ensures that restaurants like the Big Bang do well: “There’s a massive intelligent, affluent market. There are people who will pay the Covered Market prices. The populace of Oxford is keen to keep the town an interesting place.” There is also the strong possibility that niche business models like the Big Bang, which only serves food and drink produced in a twenty mile radius, may be the only viable business model in the future. As Mr. Mason explains: “In three or four years time, when petrol is ridiculously expensive, all restaurants will have to source everything locally because it’s not going to be viable to source things from nine or eleven hundred miles away.” Until then, you can choose between a bowl of noodles, a burger or bangers and mash next time you go out for dinner.

Ten percent of adults suffer from a phobia – that is, “an uncontrollable, irrational and persistent fear of a specific object, situation or activity”. This is hardly surprising given the extensive and eclectic number of phobias on offer. These range from the fear of enclosed spaces (claustrophobia) to fear of bald people (peladophobia) to fear of long words (hippopotomonstrosesquippedaliophobia – certainly long enough to give anyone a fright). Indeed, any Oxford student has a good chance of developing ergophobia, the fear of work, or at the very least, bibliophobia, the fear of books.

The question of why we have phobias has frustrated psychologists for centuries. Freudians detect a causal link between a child’s relationship with his parents and his behaviour in his later years. For example, adult agoraphobics (those who fear open spaces) may have once feared abandonment by a cold and unaffectionate mother, which has led to a fear of rejection or helplessness in adulthood. Alternatively, agoraphobia may develop in people seeking to avoid situations they have found painful or embarrassing in the past.
Others posit the theory that phobias are socially transmittable. Research suggests that half of all people with phobias have never had a painful experience with the object of their fears. It is therefore possible that, having heard of an injury inflicted on another person by a specific thing,  for this reason, someone has developed a vicarious fear of that  thing.

But do phobias develop over time or are they within us innately, from time immemorial? It is suggested that humans have acquired fears of certain animals and situations that, in our evolutionary history, threatened our survival, thereby explaining why snakes and spiders are the top two creature phobias. Our ancestors spent much time on the savannas in Africa, the women gathering food on their knees with their infants close by. Whereas lions could be seen from a distance and therefore avoided, spiders and snakes were concealed and so posed a more threatening ‘invisible’ danger.

Another factor to consider is whether or not phobias are culture-specific. Agoraphobia for example, is much more common in the US and Europe than in other areas of the world, while a phobia common in Japan, but almost nonexistent in the West, is taijin kyofusho, an incapacitating fear of offending others through one's own awkward social behaviour. Since modesty and a sensitive regard for others is strongly entrenched in Japanese society, tajin kyofusho can be seen as a product of Japan’s distinctive value system.

Katie Duval goes jolly hockey sticks for leaving home early
Perhaps for you ‘boarding school’ inspires the image of eccentric young Englishmen with wing collars eating scones for tea, living in an exclusive world of rugby matches and subjected to all that is “good for the soul” – iron bedsteads, wooden floors and cold showers. If we were still living in the 1850s this description might well be accurate. But I’m not here to defend the boarding schools of our  national history. In fact, quite the opposite. As is the case with so many of our historical institutions, the old has become obsolete. It is time to throw out anachronistic sterotypes and embrace the present.

Let’s keep it modern then. True to Blairite doctrine, boarding school places emphasis on ‘independence independence independence’. Living away from home forces you to care for yourself, managing your own affairs while learning how to cook, clean and sort your own laundry. This is perhaps not an immediately appealing idea in view of the more lazy comforts of home life and the attractions of motherly pampering, but surely one steeped in valuable lessons for the future. University is much less of a culture shock when you already know how to use the washing machine. Furthermore, thrown together with all ages, students cannot fail to reap the benefits of friendships with older boys/girls. Boarding school eases the transition from childhood into adulthood.
Then there are the friendships to be made. It cannot be denied that living alongside your friends, seeing them at both the worst and best of times, makes for closer and stronger relationships. Nothing beats the boarding school in fostering a spirit of comradeship, for where else do you develop a range of ridiculous nicknames for those close to you and paint yourself hair to toe in the colour of your house to support your housemates on the sports pitch?

And finally how can one fail to appreciate the idiosyncrasies which accompany boarding school life? Dorm feasts, carol singing by candlelight under the Christmas trees, or ‘muck up’ night…the list is endless. Indeed, if you have ever romanticised about how great it would be to attend Harry Potter’s Hogwarts, think of the boarding school as a ‘muggle’ version. That said, how can you have any doubts?

Leah Hyslop recounts the evils of boarding school 
Flicking through an Enid Blyton, one might be forgiven for thinking that boarding school is an enticing prospect. Boarding stories from Malory Towers to Harry Potter have offered children a fantasy of refuge from the family home.

Like most fantasies however, this image of boarding schools is intrinsically flawed. The boarding school fails to provide a sense of the realities of everyday life. Sent away at a vulnerable age to a place in which everything – from food, to cleaning arrangements, to after school activities – is largely provided for them, the boarding school is an enclosed environment where students have little independence. Encouraged to follow a set of pre-established rules, the students of Britain’s 700 boarding schools today live in a rigid social environment which the more flexible external world they will one day live in can never provide.

Distasteful as the fact is, the majority of boarding school students will be drawn from the same upper middle class sphere, and the average student’s opportunities to meet new people and forge new friendships are sharply neutralized by the fact the boarding school student spends his time socializing with the same people he has been taught with for six years.

Conducive to isolation and exclusivity, boarding schools are liable to breed a sense of superiority in their students. That a boarding school can offer the same nurture and guidance to a child as the familial home is a myth. The interaction between child and parent is one of the formative experiences of growing up, and whilst boarding schools can, and these days often do, provide emotional guidance, such relationships never provide the same level of intimacy as the parental bond. Moving as they do between school and home, boarding school’s student’s relationship with his parents is a part-time affair and family stability is difficult to achieve.
Though teachers can help with homesick students, the teacher’s role as both distant authoritarian and out-of-school support system is too ambiguously defined for young children to be comfortable with. Happy as they might be to be part of a community, it is this same sense of community which can often smother a student’s sense of individual worth. This can have the unfortunate results that their products feel less a person than part of an institution.

You might not immediately be able to put a face to the name ‘Laura Linney’. And you wouldn’t be the only one, since despite a prolific film career spanning over a decade, and a wide range of prestigious award nominations, she rarely appears in the press unless in connection with her latest film or character. You’ll have a hard time trying to find Linney gracing the gossip pages of Heat magazine. Perhaps this is why I don’t instantly recognise her when introduced to her amongst a small group of people having a civilised cup of tea at the Randolph. Those who are unfamiliar with Linney’s filmography will most likely recognise her as “that American one from Love Actually”, or as Frasier Crane’s girlfriend, if you were still watching Frasier by 2004.

Linney’s career thus far has seen her working with some of the most well-respected artists in Hollywood, in a host of highly influential films, and yet she remains surprisingly level-headed and approachable. Interviewers in the past have noted how Linney frequently makes sure to introduce herself personally to everyone present, and our interview does not prove an exception. Standing to shake hands with each flustered student that arrives to meet her, she remains unwaveringly friendly and, much to my relief, wholly unpatronising. We begin with small talk about malfunctioning Dictaphones, as I attempt to set mine up, before I enquire whether she’s managed to visit some of the more picturesque Oxford Colleges – ‘I would have’, she says sadly, ‘but they’re closed to the public, so I sort of peeked in through the gate and tried to get a sneak look in’. I consider pointing out that she’d find it relatively easy to use her celebrity status to get a private tour, but it’s becoming increasingly clear that such antics wouldn’t be her style.

A brief glance at the films Linney has featured in over the last decade reveals real variation in the projects she chooses to take on. From the unnerving thriller ‘The Mothman Prophecies’, to quirky blockbuster ‘The Truman Show’, or even the Edith Wharton classic ‘The House of Mirth’, Linney refuses to restrict herself to one genre, no matter how successful she may prove to be within it. She denies sticking to any sort of overall ‘game plan’ when selecting roles, believing that having such a fixed career path and setting out to prove oneself to the public is often counterproductive. ‘When actors choose their own material, I think it’s a little dangerous because there’s some personal agenda there that’s at work that isn’t necessarily very good for the material’. She may well have a point. It’s often painfully obvious when actors take on a particularly controversial role merely for the sake of publicity (‘Eyes Wide Shut’ anyone?), or veer towards films they believe have ‘Oscar winning potential’ (think gay cowboy dramas and the like). This is a technique which can go horribly wrong, with actors choosing parts which they simply can’t pull off. ‘You can see some people choosing something that just doesn’t work, and you can tell they did it because they wanted to be sexier, or there was some need to prove a side of their personality…’

Yet Linney seems to avoid falling into this trap, genuinely choosing projects based on their artistic worth, or how much they interest her. Such an attitude certainly involves making sacrifices – for her role in the low-budget film You Can Count On Me, released in 2000, she received the union minimum wage of $10,000, but was rewarded in return with her first Academy Award Nomination for Best Actress. She received a second nomination a few years later, this time for Best Supporting Actress, for her role in Kinsey, in which she played the eponymous sex psychologist’s wife, opposite Liam Neeson. This approach to her career may explain why she’s been involved in such a wide range of different films, and successfully avoided being typecast.

So what persuades her to take on a new project? Unsurprisingly, ‘nine times out of ten it’s the script and what potential the script holds. Then there’s director or actors. There has to be one of those three elements. If there are two of the three then that’s pretty good…’ So has she ever been involved in something with all three elements? The response is instantaneous – ‘Yes. Mystic River, because that had a great script, Clint Eastwood and Sean Penn. Didn’t take long to figure that one out.’

Her immense enthusiasm for these films, evident in the warmth with which she talks about them, undoubtedly results in intense dedication to the project in hand. Listening to Linney describe how she manages to cope with the disjointed way of filming a movie, out of chronological order, gives you a particularly clear insight into her approach to acting. ‘A lot of times, I’ll take a big piece of cardboard and I’ll make charts and lists and graphs, and I do all sorts of “mad scientist” things so if I do a scene, I can see where it falls in sequence.’ This science metaphor seems appropriate here, since Linney’s approach to the development of her character seems almost mathematical – ‘if I know something in scene five has to hit in scene sixty, I need to set it up properly. If I’m, doing scene 59 and there was something that I did in scene 7 that relates to that, I have to remember what happened.’ Award shows and glamour aside, Linney clearly takes each role very seriously.

As an actress, she doesn’t like to anticipate, in the long term, where her career might take her, preferring, as she puts it, ‘the unexpected things in life – that’s just the life of an actor.’ As such, when I enquire as to what her dream role would be, she is adamant that she can’t bring herself to try and imagine it. ‘You know, I can’t answer that, because I don’t think that way. I wish I did. I really wish I could think that way. It would make my life, and probably my agent’s life much easier, but part of the fun for me is not knowing what’s around the corner’.

Indeed, her career has been far from one-track, with Linney eager to switch, at least temporarily, from film to television when given the opportunity, most notably in a recurring role on Frasier, for which she won her second Emmy award. ‘The thing that was so interesting, and the reason I did it, was that I know absolutely nothing about the sitcom’. The experience, she says, was completely different to any of her previous projects, and highly liberating – ‘you have to be willing to be very flexible, because things change constantly… you really have to be as free and as easy as you possibly can be, and not let yourself be thrown by anything. You have to go into sitcoms with a real sense of joy.’

On the other end of the spectrum, Linney’s appearances on Broadway have seen her tackle highly serious dramas, most noticeably Arthur Miller’s The Crucible, in which she and Liam Neeson, in their roles as Elizabeth and John Proctor, created an “emotional temperature that leaves you weak”, as one enthralled critic put it. When asked whether she’ll be gracing the boards of London’s West End in the near future, she insists that ‘anywhere I’m invited to in theatre I would pretty much show up’, (take note, budding student directors) and admits that she’s hoping to make a return to the stage before long.

Linney genuinely seems to revel working within a large cast of characters, be it on the stage or in front of the camera. Speaking about ‘Love Actually’ she admits to finding the experience a hugely positive one – ‘I loved being around all those people, I loved the ensemble feel, that one producer would do something and then pass the baton to the next producer. It was this sort of collage of little things, and you were just a small part of something much bigger.’

As the interview draws to a close, I ask her what she’s going to be talking about at the Union, and the reply is unsurprisingly modest – ‘mostly it’ll probably be more Q & A, just where I think I can be more helpful… just seeing what students are wondering about’.

At this she stands once more to greet her next eager visitor. One presumes she must get rather tired of this process, after a decade in the spotlight, but if she does then she certainly doesn’t let it show.

By Daisy Johnson 
The word ‘fuck’ retains its official status as one of the foremost ‘taboo words’ in the English language, ranking third after those real stinkers that you aren’t allowed to have in print. However, since making its debut on BBC television in 1965 the word ‘fuck’ has become so popular that you wouldn’t bat an eyelid at its use. Having said that, I did recently hear a girl say to her friend in a scandalised whisper, “You can’t say ‘fuck’ in the British Museum!”, but really, even recourse to it in a tutorial would not cause much of a stir. What explanation can be given for ‘fuck’s’ paradoxical position between profanity and popularity?

In terms of profanity, ‘fuck’ is one of the oldest words, maintaining the vulgar meaning of its earliest usage. The OED holds that its roots are Anglo-Saxon, though its first identified written use in English was by the Scottish poet William Dunbar. In his delightful poem, “In Secreit Place”, a real love story about a liaison between a kitchen maid and a smooth-talking city boy. In the line “Yit be his feiris he wald haif fukkit”, ‘fuck’ is used in an almost identical context to its primary meaning today. Not to spell it out too explicitly, the kitchen maid has thus far withheld her favours from the city boy, and he’s getting a bit impatient, because “by his fire, he’d like to…” etc. Earlier even than this, the bastardised Latin ‘fuccant’ appears in a coded poem written in Latin and English some time before 1500. Attempts to translate the code have yielded “non sunt in coeli, quia fuccant wivys of heli”, which is “[the monks] are not in heaven, because they fuck the wives of Ely”. Notably, even in these very early uses of the word, ‘fuck’ is associated with severe impiety and bawdy behaviour, and was regarded even then as a taboo word.

So what typically constitutes taboo words? And why does ‘fuck’ remain one of them? Swear words, which exist in almost all languages and cultures, are certain words considered to be vulgar, usually because of their association with a corresponding social taboo. In English, swear words are largely related either to blasphemy, and particularly the defaming of Christianity, or, as in the case of ‘fuck’, related to obscenity. Quite logically, the more improper the action associated with a swear word, the greater the impropriety of uttering it. Lesser taboo actions, such as burping and swearing which, whilst considered generally impolite behaviour in public, and thus linguistically unsophisticated rude, are not actively offensive, and so do not rank as ‘swear words’. One might imagine the consequences, however, of performing ‘fuck’s’ associated action in public. This comparison is sufficient to explain ‘fuck’s’ classification as a swear word.

Of course, references to the naughty and socially inappropriate things we do are frequent and sometimes unavoidable, but a separate language exists for describing sex (‘sex’ itself being an example). Words such as this are hardly considered swear words. It must be concluded then that ‘fuck’ is so offensive not because of the physical action it describes, but because of the intent with which it is spoken. It is certainly the case that the word is rarely said without an indication of contempt and crudity. In fact, there is almost an element of self-aggrandisement about the use of ‘fuck’ – swearing, after all, is cool. There’s no denying it. Using ‘fuck’ suggests promotion of free speech and sexual liberation, which places you in the camp of ‘fuck’ pioneers like D.H. Lawrence, whose battle in Lady Chatterley’s Lover to use ‘fuck’ and ‘cunt’ as parts of every day speech was finally won when the novel was published in 1960, three decades after its completion. In fact, the sixties saw the real beginnings of the widespread use of ‘fuck’ in the public and media spheres. It is certainly appropriate that the first man to say it on television, the critic Kenneth Tynan, became a pornographer in the ‘70s. The use of ‘fuck’ finds you upholding trendy sixties principles of freedom and radical thought. Super cool, right?

Right. Except it would be foolish to suggest, in 2007, that every person who utters ‘fuck’ as the Tesco carrier bag on their handlebars swings dangerously close to the spokes of their bike wheel is demonstrating their support for the free love movement. Realistically the reason that ‘fuck’ is becoming more common has little to do with its role as a symbol of anti-establishment subversiveness. In fact, it is mainly because ‘fuck’ is being progressively dissociated from its literal meaning and finding a place as a mere linguistic expletive. ‘Fuck’ and its associated parts of speech are rarely now used to really swear. Instead it is most commonly either a descriptive word, or an interjection of anger, surprise or even delight.

‘Fuck’, and particularly ‘fucking’, has considerable power as descriptive speech. ‘Fucking’ with its freedom to be classified as an adjective or adverb depending on context, can be used as an intensifier with a greater force than a simple ‘very’ or ‘really’. Consider the difference between saying “not fucking likely” and “not very likely”. The two are going to get very different reactions, and certainly have different meanings. The former is much more forcerful and negative, thanks to the power and shock-factor still associated with ‘fuck’ Also, as an interjection, ‘fuck’ is a surprisingly meaty and satisfying utterance. It opens with a fricative consonant, ‘f’, which is formed by forcing air through the channel made when the lower lip and the upper teeth come together, and closes with an aggressive ‘ck’, formed by stopping airflow in the vocal tract. This combination works to create a very definite and harsh sound, which can alter in tone to deliver a strong impression of a particular emotion. For example, the typical loud use of ‘fuck’ to express anger or frustration comes out like a verbal punch; it is a cathartic utterance which embodies and goes some way to exorcising the anger of the speaker. Alternatively, a ‘fu-uck!’ which goes down at the end and has a drawn out vowel is a verbal image of surprise or disbelief. ‘Fuck’ with a smile is a kind of happy, feelgood expression. A recent survey by a professor of management at the University of East Anglia has found that swearing in the workplace as a means of diffusing tension and high emotion in fact boosts team spirit and morale, so long as it remains in the form of interjection and not personal insult, because it can foster solidarity amongst employees and encourage them to share their feelings. The professor, Yehuda Baruch, hopes the survey will encourage people to re-evaluate the role swearing can play in our lives.

In an attempt to do that, then, it should be acknowledged that ‘fuck’ may have lost some of the taboo present in its literal use as it has become more prominently employed as a simple space-filling interjection or useful intensifier. The danger now, perhaps, is that linguistically it will move the other way, and become a clichéd form of speech, requiring us to formulate new taboos for our own time. Since I am rather fond of it in speech, I would counsel avoidance of excessive over-use of the F-word, for fear it will diminish even further in impact. For tips and tricks in this matter, perhaps consult the wiki – ‘How to stop swearing’, which demands that you punish yourself for excessive swearing, and reward yourself each time you manage to substitute ‘flip’ for ‘fuck’. “Don’t think you’re not cool when you don’t swear! You’re cooler!” On second thoughts though – fuck it.

While you are gently sleeping on a Saturday night in late October (OK, fine, while your feet are sticking to the floor in The Bridge), a college somewhere in Oxford dresses up in sub-fusc, stocks up on port and walks backwards around a quad, spinning at the corners. For an hour.

Yes, it’s the (in)famous Time Ceremony that has been part of Merton’s history since 1971. It seems the college that apparently never leaves the library has gone loopy. The ‘official’ website that you can find on Google doesn’t help much either – it describes the ceremony as “designed to remedy the ill effects of man’s abrupt interference with the diurnal cycle”. But let’s just think about it for a second. A Saturday doing something that is quirky, eccentric and quintessentially Oxfordian? Plus a chance to quaff stupid amounts of fortified wine? Surely it is better than yet another stale night dancing to the same old tunes in the same old place with the same old drinks on offer. Plus it gives you an interesting story for friends from other colleges and universities, or even ultimately the grandchildren. Provided that the port hasn’t messed with your brain’s memory stores by then, of course.

The ceremony itself is notoriously difficult to get into. The late gates of the College are locked and entry is only through the lodge, with a Bod card and provided no non-Mertonians accompany you. It seems that akin to the Freemasons, we think that we are the only ones able to save the world – in this case from the rupture in the space-time continuum that the putting back of the clocks inevitably leads to. Two toasts are held at the Sundial Lawn, a self-proclaimed centre of the universe – including a call for “Viva la counter-revolution”. The self-professed reactionaries then walk backwards for an hour, drinking vast quantities of port, making fools of themselves and generally trying not to fall on the grass. In the name of the universe of course.

Walking forwards doesn’t feel quite natural for some time afterwards, and you are reminded why port is in the same group as morris-dancing and Harry Hill: it’s an acquired taste. But the ceremony is an amazing experience in an all-Oxford way. Merton is often thought of as the ‘work hard’ college – and whilst that might be true, people shouldn’t forget that the phrase also contains a ‘play hard’ part. When we’re not walking around backwards at least.

It is a sad fact that Oxford is not known for its raving. Books, yes. Archaic traditions, yes. Grimy drug-fuelled hedonism, no. We simply don’t have the time, even if we had the inclination in the first place. Several hours frenzied dancing, and an exhaustion that can last for days are not conducive to essay deadlines. Thus raving has been something of a minority pursuit, with only a hard core of committed individuals bravely setting forth into their sweJames Kingstonaty basements on a regular basis. No longer. Experts have observed the rise and rise of a new breed of raver across the land, a breed particularly suited to Oxford; the Rahver. You may have seen them; you may even be one of them already. One thing is for certain: they are inescapable. Glow-sticked and glow-painted, the hordes are here to stay.
Luckily, they are easy to spot, even when not wearing their standard uniforms of retro Adidas track jackets, aviators, coloured leggings or, for the more daring, a mild gurn. The average rahver is convinced he is a bit of raver, and this is how we can catch him out. Central to this self-identification is a professed love of drum and bass. (though even this is not always essential – last night at the Coven ‘Halloween Rave’, all the glammed-up rahvers, perhaps confused, danced to 50 Cent and YMCA. Fools.) For those of us unversed in the ways of the rave, drum and bass is, as defined by Wikipedia, a type of music “characterised by fast tempo broken beat drums (generally between 160–180 beats per minute) with heavy, often intricate basslines”. It being a well established genre, there are many different DJs (“disk jockeys” to those OUCA members out there), mixes, mixers, labels, etc, to be listened to. The Rahver, rather sadly given their occasional attempts at authenticity, knows only one group, a group taken as representative of all dnb – Pendulum, the knowledge of whom is used thus in conversation, perhaps as one meets another cool looking kid.

“So what sort of music are you into mate?”
“I’m big into my Drum and Bass, actually – I really like Pendulum”
“Oh cool. What else are you into then?”
“Well I really like seeing Pendulum live”

To be a true rahver you must know this group, know every track name (“Put Slam on! Put Slam on!”), and talk about Pendulum every time raving comes up in conversation. The true raver, however, is not fooled – Pendulum are but one group, and one that may even be (whisper it) a bit…mainstream. Of course, this being Oxford and us students a canny lot, some more dedicated rahvers are aware of this, and despise Pendulum, whilst pretending to know of ever more obscure music. Each preciously aims to go to more and more events, so that he can appear more and more hardcore. Each jealously accumulates a knowledge of increasingly esoteric sub-genres – ‘psy-trance’, ‘liquid jungle’, ’scouse house’ ‘happy hardcore’, ‘raga drum dub’, ‘euphoric trance’, ‘hardcore gabba’ and, of course, ‘drum dub raga scouse’. After all, if you can’t be a bit edgy and feel yourself superior to others, then what is the point of adopting a subculture in the first place? One-upmanship is the essence of true rahving.  

So why ‘Rah’ver? And how can we become them, aside from adopting a Pendulum obsession? A Rahver is ‘rah’ because he or she is essentially not a part of the grimy drum and bass scene. Often private schooled, a rahver feels equally at home at a cocktail party, or assaulting a pile of books in preparation for an essay. The true drum and bass fanatic, gurning his way through life in a constant cycle of pill induced ups and downs, most certainly is not.  Rahving allows us clean kids to get a delightful frisson of underground cool – and of, course, display our creative side. The rahver, instead of the grimy T-shirt favoured by the other inhabitants of raves, will dress up in fabulously bright clothing. Strange headgear, funky trousers and leggings, brightly patterned shirts, and an improbable amount of glowsticks are key to the rahve uniform.

For it is a uniform. Finding conformity in their non-conformity (exactly like the indie kids they sneer at) rahvers daub themselves in fluorescent paint, just so that under the UV lights they stand out as all the more crazy and unique – though compared to the poor drug-addled wrecks who can occasionally be glimpsed at dnb events (at whom the rahvers cast disapproving glares, shocked by the obvious naughtyness), the rahvers, despite all their attempts, are neither. So, if you too wish to be a rahver, remain sure of two things – your own vibrant superiority, and that it’s only for the weekend.